NEW YORK INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY Beta blockers have become a prescription drug staple for recovering heart attack patients. However, these blood pressure-reducing medications cannot be tolerated by many patients who are at higher risk for developing cardiovascular disease, including those with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and asthma, the elderly, and diabetics. As seen in...
Category: <span>Clinical Practice</span>
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DPP-4I not tied to increased risk of acute pancreatitis in seniors
(HealthDay)—For older adults, dipeptidyl peptidase 4 inhibitors (DPP-4Is) are not associated with increased risk of acute pancreatitis, according to a study published online April 4 in Diabetes Care. Jin-Liern Hong, Ph.D., from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and colleagues examined the risks of acute pancreatitis among U.S. Medicare beneficiaries, aged 66+ years, initiating DDP-4Is versus...
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Brain activity can predict success of depression treatment
McLean Hospital and Harvard Medical School researchers believe they have uncovered a method that could be useful in predicting a depressed patient’s treatment prognosis, prior to starting treatment. In the paper “Pretreatment Rostral Anterior Cingulate Cortex Activity in Relation to Symptom Improvement in Depression: A Randomized Clinical Trial,” currently available online and scheduled to appear...
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Gamified augmented reality against ADHD
The preliminary study found that measures of hyperactivity, inattention, and impulsivity dropped by 56.4 percent in the patient group with high scores of ADHD, while by 66.3 percent in the group with low symptomatic signs 48 hours after the session with Empowered Brain. In the framework of the clinical trial, children, adolescents and young adults with...
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How can digital health impact primary care?
Healthcare is on the verge of a paradigm shift due to digital technologies, as our Digital Health Manifesto points out. Trends and research suggest that in the next years, medicine will shift from a reactive to a proactive discipline. Moreover, to stay at the letter P, it is said to become personalized, preventive and participatory. With the...
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Virtual Reality Is Used in Clinical Practice
Dr. Brennan M. Spiegel and his research team at the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center have been experimenting with virtual reality (VR) for years. I had a fruitful and very exciting correspondence with him about moments of immersion, virtual pharmacies or how to travel to Iceland without leaving your hospital bed. Read on! VR is an area of...
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Smartphone ‘scores’ can help doctors track severity of Parkinson’s disease symptoms
Parkinson’s disease, a progressive brain disorder, is often tough to treat effectively because symptoms, such as tremors and walking difficulties, can vary dramatically over a period of days, or even hours. To address this challenge, Johns Hopkins University computer scientists, working with an interdisciplinary team of experts from two other institutions, have developed a new...
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Allina study shows patients with very small breast tumors may forgo lymph node biopsies
Study examined the outcomes of 294 patients, found only 1.5 percent had positive lymph nodes How to treat patients who have microinvasive breast cancer – tumors that are 1 mm or less in size (the thickness of a dime) — is somewhat controversial. Can these tiny tumors affect the lymph nodes and spread cancer to...
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New ‘Pan-Cancer’ analysis reveals the common roots of different cancers
In the largest study of its kind, cancer researchers analyzed and classified over 10,000 tumors from 33 cancer types to trace connections between different cancers. Typically cancers are classified by where they originate in the body–think breast cancer, stomach cancer, and so on. But a collaboration called the Pan-Cancer Initiative, launched in 2012 at a...
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Stretchable Stick-On Ultrasound Patches Image Even on Curved Surfaces
Conventional ultrasound transducers are rigid devices that have to be held against the skin when imaging inside the body. The best results are achieved on smooth surfaces where contact between the transducer and the skin is the greatest. On curvy, moving surfaces, such as the knees, ultrasound visualizations are difficult. A team at the University...